


My Brother's Keeper

by perdiccas



Category: Heroes - Fandom
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe - High School, Barebacking, Community: heroes_exchange, First Time, Incest, M/M, Pre-Canon, twin 'verse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-02-18
Updated: 2009-02-18
Packaged: 2017-10-02 10:33:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,383
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5378
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/perdiccas/pseuds/perdiccas
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>With high school now behind them, Gabriel isn't sure how he and Peter, and what they have, fit into a world that wants to break them apart.</p>
            </blockquote>





	My Brother's Keeper

**Author's Note:**

> Written for icalynn in the heroes_exchange 2009 Valentine's Day Fic Exchange. Many thanks to my beta, aurilly.

Gabriel sits on Peter's bed in the room they used to share. The graduation party turned going away party wasn't his idea, but he's fulfilled his familial duty and shown his face. Now he's slipped away, and he doubts that anyone notices that he is gone; even if they do, Gabriel thinks that they would only register his absence with a long-suffering sigh of relief.

Peter's the one with things to celebrate, and a plane to catch in the morning. He's heading out to Chile to build houses and paint orphanages, to save the world one person at a time. Letting him go had been their parents' one concession when Peter finally allowed his arm to be twisted, signing up for pre-law like a good Petrelli boy.

But Gabriel can't celebrate that, and it's not because he knows, deep down, that pre-law will never stick, just like their father fears. And it's not, as their mother thinks, that he's jealous that Peter's going to South America while he's stuck spending the summer in New York. Gabriel has been conscripted into doing an internship with a friend of a friend of the family, someone not close enough to the Petrellis to realise he's getting shafted when they fobbed him off with Gabriel not Peter.

The problem is that Gabriel can't bring himself to be a part of any celebration where what's being celebrated is Peter leaving him for months on end. He wants to be happy for his brother, but all Gabriel can think about is that when Peter gets back, they'll have little more than a week together before they're shunted off to colleges on opposite coasts. Things will never be the same again.

Nathan may be the only one who has any inkling to exactly how adrift he's feeling, because when he handed Gabriel a cigar, he squeezed his arm and said, "Happy graduation," with an intonation that made his words sound more like, "I'm sorry for your loss."

They leaned, shoulder to shoulder, against the far garden wall and watched as Peter slow danced with the prom queen, a girl that Peter said their mother had insisted he invite. But Gabriel knows that he wouldn't have asked her to dance if he didn't really like her. Peter isn't cruel, and sometimes he seems like the only Petrelli who wouldn't play with someone's emotions simply to keep up appearances. When Gabriel turned away, unable to watch as they kissed, Nathan had laid a comforting hand on his back, but didn't try to get him to stay.

If Gabriel can't find it in himself to be happy for Peter tonight, then the least he can do is be useful. He holds Peter's battered alarm clock in his hand. It's scuffed around the edges from the many times it has been thrown across the room. It loses time, and it's a 50/50 bet whether the alarm will actually ring, but Peter's had it since there were bunk beds in this room and he insists on taking it with him to Chile.

In the fall, Gabriel will be doing mechanical engineering, and he reckons that he's more than a match for a temperamental, two-dollar alarm clock. So, armed with the pocket screwdriver that Peter gave him for a birthday years ago, when, in between shirts that itched and fencing lessons he definitely didn't want, Peter was the only one to give him something that he truly liked, Gabriel opens the back and pokes around. He's never worked on a clock before, but he can spot the problem straight away. After years of abuse, Peter's managed to knock more than one screw loose inside.

Gabriel is so caught up in studying the surprising intricacies inside the clock's casing, that for a moment, he manages to forget the dull ache in his chest that's been growing there for weeks, deepening steadily as this night drew closer. He's so immersed in what he's doing that he doesn't notice that Peter's there until he sits on the bed beside him.

Gabriel jumps and scowls at him, but Peter merely laughs, because what's the point in having a brother if you can't sneak up on him and scare him shitless just one more time before graduation is over and adulthood supposedly sets in? Peter puts his hand on Gabriel's shoulder and, though it hurts Gabriel as much or more than the rejection could ever hurt Peter, he shrugs the touch away.

"What're you doing up here, all alone?" Peter asks.

"Just fixing this."

Gabriel thrusts the alarm clock into Peter's hands and stands to leave, a blush rising in his cheeks at being caught mooning on his brother's bed.

"Thanks," Peter mutters as he puts the clock aside.

He stands too and grabs Gabriel's wrist, holding him with a grip so loose that all Gabriel need do is twist his hand away to leave. But instead, Gabriel lets himself be stopped, as he always does.

"You've been avoiding me all night, Gabe. Gabriel," he amends when he sees Gabriel flinch at the nickname that their father uses so derisively. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing," he shrugs.

"Gabriel. Talk to me."

Long, slim fingers curl around his shoulder, squeezing softly and Peter drops his wrist to snake his other arm around Gabriel's chest, holding him in a firm embrace.

"Please, Gabriel." His breath is warm on Gabriel's neck and when Gabriel sinks back into his touch, Peter's arms are strong and his chest is solid despite his smaller frame.

"I don't know, I just… Parties and all those people, that's not my kind of thing. And besides," Gabriel adds quietly, "I didn't want to get in your way."

Peter moves to face him, keeping his arms around Gabriel's body and sliding his hands up Gabriel's back to lace his fingers at the nape of his neck. He rocks up on the balls of his feet and tugs Gabriel down until their noses touch.

"You can never be in my way," he whispers, and Gabriel has to shut his eyes to the intensity of Peter's gaze.

He can feel the heat of Peter's skin just inches from his own and he can smell the unfamiliar scent of champagne and Nathan's cigars lingering on Peter's breath. When he opens his eyes once more, he can see, smeared on Peter's earnest, crooked smile, the shimmering lip-gloss of the girl he's been kissing. Her perfume, still caught on Peter's collar, is a cloying chemical sweetness that seems to threaten to suffocate Gabriel with his every breath.

"I don't think your date would have seen it that way," he says gruffly. He turns away from Peter's arms. The heavy weight in his chest is back and he wonders if it will always hurt so much to see Peter happy without him.

"Don't be like that, Gabe." This time his voice is softer and there's nothing about the nickname that makes Gabriel wince.

Peter cups his jaw and pulls him back to face him. "Is that what this is about? Me dancing with some girl? You've never minded before."

"No," Gabriel murmurs. He leans down into Peter's touch and rubs his cheek against Peter's palm while Peter is still there to be touched. But the music outside changes, now louder and more upbeat, and it breaks in on the moment until Gabriel has to close the window, muffling the outside world but unable to shut it out entirely.

Peter comes to stand beside him, peeking over his shoulder at the people gathered down below. "That's meant to be our party," he says.

"But it's not, is it?" Gabriel counters. If his words and tone are angry and sad all at once, then they are nowhere near as angry and sad as he is feeling right now, with Peter hours from going away. "It's all Mom's friends and Dad's colleagues and people that Nathan needs to impress. We can't even be ourselves at our own party, Peter. Who we really are."

"No," Peter says. "No, we can't. But is that what you want? Parties and all those people," he adds softly. "That's not really your kind of thing."

"I know. I know, Pete. But everything's changing and…" Gabriel doesn't need to finish his thought because Peter is there, as he always is, finishing it for him.

"It's scary," Peter whispers. "I know." And for the first time since they've been plunged into the melee of growing up---with college applications and finals and prom dates---Gabriel thinks that maybe Peter isn't any more ready to give up who they've been than he is.

"We're changing, too." Gabriel wants desperately for Peter to say that it's not true, that who they are and what they have is the one untouchable constant in their lives, but instead, Peter says, "I know," again, soft and low and sad. And Gabriel wonders if this is it, the end that he's been fearing since this all began.

"But change," Peter murmurs, pressing a lopsided kiss with lopsided lips to the corner of Gabriel's mouth, as he slides the glasses from Gabriel's face. "…doesn't have to be a bad thing."

Peter kisses him tenderly, a gentle tongue sliding against Gabriel's, but he also pushes at Gabriel's shoulders hungrily, groaning at Gabriel's ready acquiescence. Stretched out on the bed, with his twin's slighter body above him, one slim thigh wedged between his own and two slender hands pinning his arms above his head, Gabriel thinks that there's nothing about this that he would ever want to change.

But Peter keeps his lips soft and his kisses slow, pulling back a little when Gabriel's head rises from the pillows to try and force what Peter doesn't seem to want to give just yet. Gabriel can feel the familiar weight and press of Peter's cock against his hip, hardening as their kiss draws on. Gabriel's body flushes with that heat, that near overwhelming rush of hormones that prickles his skin and tugs at his every nerve from his balls to his chest.

His fingers wind in Peter's hair and Peter's rake through his, that same, thick, dark Petrelli mop that makes Peter look rebellious and Gabriel seem older than his years. Gabriel knows that this is wrong, and that they shouldn't. The law's against them and society, too. In the back of his mind, Gabriel knows that the God their family seems to worship on Christmas and Easter only would frown on his love for Peter more than any of the immoral, sinful things their family has done combined. But deep down, Gabriel knows that what's really wrong and sick and unforgivable isn't what they're doing but rather how they feel; however, no amount of denying themselves could ever make those feelings stop.

So, instead of saying no or pushing Peter away like he always should but never can, Gabriel simply raises his head, squinting at the door.

"It's locked," Peter murmurs against his lips.

_Of course it is_, Gabriel thinks, because Peter, for all the flightiness and the casual absent-mindedness with which he treats the girls who flock around him, is ever mindful of keeping Gabriel safe from the consequences of this dangerous thing they do. But it was Gabriel, cautious, nervous Gabriel, too shy, his family thinks, to be of any use, who threw common sense to the wind and initiated their first kiss. How could he not, when what they have feels, sometimes, like a force of nature, a desire so all-consuming and destructive that to try to deny it would be as futile as standing tall against a hurricane, or shouting _stop_ at the crash and break of a tidal wave?

Gabriel knows that Peter feels responsible, not just for this relationship they have, but for _him_. Gabriel is the elder, by two minutes and thirty seconds at least, but it is Peter who is the leader. It is Peter whom people respect and it is in Peter's shadow that Gabriel lives his life, jostled to the side by their parents, and even Nathan sometimes. But Peter never makes him feel like a lesser, more gangly version of his twin, the ugly one who stammers in the face of their father's disapproving glare. Maybe it's because Peter knows what it's like, too, to feel like second-best. While Gabriel lurks in the edges of Peter's limelight, it is Nathan who outshines them both.

Gabriel relaxes back, and, free from the fear of interruption, he tugs at the bowtie at Peter's neck. His own chest feels tight with want and his nipples are hard, oversensitive flesh dragging against the starched and unforgiving cotton of his shirtfront. And maybe change _can_ be good, because Gabriel can count on one hand the times they've been together like this, luxuriating in the touch and feel and taste of each other, going so slow it seems like the most exquisite torture. But ahead of them stretch dorm rooms and apartments, an unknown freedom as they escape from under their mother's ever watchful, hawk-like stare.

Yet, there is knot of apprehension in Gabriel's gut that can't be shifted. What if there is such a thing as too much freedom? What if, with all the opportunities the world has to offer, Peter one day no longer wants what he's always had, what might suddenly seem too disgustingly close to home?

One by one, with slow determination, Peter slides the buttons open on Gabriel's shirt and sucks at the crook of his neck, leaving a hickey simply because he can. Gabriel swats him away and rubs at the mark. But Peter merely laughs impishly, exactly as he will when Nathan teases Gabriel to blushing about the "girl" who tried to devour him with kisses.

Peter's hands roam through Gabriel's chest hair, thick and dark and not something Gabriel's sure he likes yet at all. The coarse thatch seems to him the tipping point that has left him and Peter twins that no one can be sure are truly related. But Peter seems fascinated at the differences between their bodies and kisses through the hair to the firm chest below, brushing the pads of his thumbs over Gabriel's nipples and the hair that seems to have spread there too.

He kisses lower, wriggling down Gabriel's body and grunting in impatience when Gabriel makes him stop to pull the shirt over Peter's head. As soon as he's free of it, his lips are back on Gabriel's skin, so quickly that Gabriel thinks that maybe Peter feels the same sense of something _missing_ as he does, when they can't be touching.

As he mouths over Gabriel's stomach, Peter's lips curl into that small, uneven smile that Gabriel knows even Nathan doesn't get to see, not like this, not pressed against his navel with Peter's body curving over him and Peter's cock heavy against his thigh.

"What's wrong?" Peter murmurs into his skin because there's tension in the muscles of Gabriel's abdomen and his body thrums with the fear that they're stretching this out because this time will be the last time they do this.

"Nothing," he says. He knows that Peter will see through the lie as he has seen through every lie Gabriel has ever tried to spin, but if this is the last time he'll have Peter in his arms, Gabriel thinks that he'd rather not know until Peter is kissing him goodbye.

However, Peter never could leave well enough alone, and with three quick kisses to belly, chest and chin, his face hovers over Gabriel's once more.

"What's wrong?" he asks again.

Gabriel shakes his head and turns his face away, surprised at how much his breath shudders when he exhales the whimper that he's been holding in. He can feel Peter's fingers, feather light, tickling the thick lashes so like his own and tracing nose, lips and brow, all fuller and broader than the delicate features of Peter's face.

"I'll never leave you," he whispers and Gabriel doesn't, truly doesn't mean to let a loud snort of disbelief escape. He's always trusted Peter, and to start calling him a liar now is a change that neither of them could want.

But for all that he wishes that Peter's words could be the truth, Gabriel can taste on his lips the waxy grease of that girl's lip-gloss, transferred from mouth to mouth, from kiss to kiss. Out of the corner of Gabriel's eye, Peter's packed to near-bursting duffle bag is a black mark that mars his vision.

"But you are," he says, unable to conceal the helpless despair in his voice. "Tomorrow. You're leaving. Leaving me."

"No," Peter insists. He leans down and rests his forehead against Gabriel's, their lips brushing past each other as they speak. "No, Gabriel. I'm leaving here, leaving this house, but never, ever leaving you."

When Gabriel swallows, his mouth is dry and he whines, low in his throat, because how can Peter want to run away and not take him, too?

"We don't stop being twins, being _us_. Just because I'm in Chile and you're still here, and just because we're going to college on opposite sides of the country doesn't mean that we're not brothers anymore, does it?"

"No," Gabriel murmurs. "No, but---"

"As long as we're still brothers, Gabe, you have me. I'm sorry," he says, Peter's voice cracking like it hasn't since it first began to break. "I'm sorry, Gabriel, but I have to go. I have to get away."

Gabriel pushes the hair from Peter's eyes and folds his hand around the back of his neck, pulling him down and kissing him breathless, chasing away the sorrow that seems to have settled on Peter's face. Gabriel knows what it's like to need to get away. He, too, needs to get away from Mom, from Dad, from the oppressive weight of expectations that he can't possibly live up to. But if only one of them can escape, Gabriel's glad it's Peter.

"I'll miss you," Peter whispers, and it's the first time in months of Santiago this and Santiago that, in all the babbling about beaches and bars and the people that Peter wants to help that Gabriel thinks that maybe he isn't just another obligation that Peter's trying to break free from.

"I'll miss you," Peter says again as his fingers mould around Gabriel's erection, feeling the size and shape of him still trapped within his pants and boxers. His eyes never leave Gabriel's face, watching him as his eyes slide shut at the steady up-down strokes of Peter's hand and when Gabriel finds the strength to open them and look up at Peter once more, he sees pupils blown wide with lust that must match his own.

And this is new, too. Peter has stroked him off before, but never like this, slow and teasing and in the full glare of the overhead lights, taking in every flicker in Gabriel's expression. It's a change that Gabriel definitely likes because, after so many months of furtive, stolen moments, kissing and touching so frenetically that they barely paused to breathe, let alone look at each other, Gabriel has begun to wonder if their haste was borne out of some deeply rooted shame that neither could ever shake.

But with the sounds of the party still raging outside whispering through the windowpane, Peter's staring at him with eyes that are more sincere than Gabriel has ever thought anyone, least of all a fellow Petrelli, capable of being. He wants to tell Peter that he'll miss him, too, and that he loves him, not at all like a brother should. But if Peter's the one with the open and honest expression, it's Gabriel who feels the more vulnerable for it. He turns away from the intensity of Peter's stare, a nervous laugh spilling from his lips.

"What're you doing, Pete?" His voice is hoarse and the words catch in his throat, his breath hitching as Peter's fingers trail along his fly. Peter's nails stutter on the fabric of his suit pants, lifting away only to alight again on Gabriel's belt, teasing the leather from the buckle with a deft flick of his wrist and shuffling down his pants and underwear.

"Showing you how much I'll miss you, Gabriel."

With one hand flat to the top of Gabriel's thigh, Peter's thumb traces over and over Gabriel's pelvic crease with a touch that makes Gabriel sigh and shudder. Then, one hand is in a ring around his cock and Peter ducks his head to kiss the tip. It's nothing but a subtle brush of lips on too-hot, too-tight skin, but Gabriel's body curls into it and finds himself half-sitting, Peter's hand on his stomach now, pushing gently down, before Gabriel knows that he's moved at all.

"Peter," he gasps, but Peter's mouth is too busy with other things for him to stop and reply. He licks a hot stripe up the side of Gabriel's erection and Gabriel looks down, jaw agape, with eyes that almost refuse to believe what they're seeing is true: Peter's narrow pink tongue sliding wetly along the darker, thicker line of his cock.

Peter puckers his lips just below the head and sucks, a contemplative hum running through his mouth as he experiments. It's near enough to too much that Gabriel's hands snap down, bracketing Peter's face and pulling him away.

"Wait," Gabriel pants, returning Peter's cocked eyebrow with a breathless chuckle as Peter wipes his mouth with the back of his hand.

"Good, right?" Peter's voice is lower, huskier than Gabriel can recall hearing it before and there's something about the rawness of his words that tells Gabriel that Peter knows, first-hand, exactly how good it feels to have a mouth on his cock.

Peter drags his nose through the thick nest of Gabriel's pubic hair, and as he does, he rubs his cheek against the length of Gabriel's cock, his skin still smooth where Gabriel's is already beginning to itch with a five-o-clock shadow. A wet line of pre-come smears along the hinge of Peter's jaw and glistens on the tips of Gabriel's fingers when he reaches down to wipe it away.

Peter's propped himself up on one elbow, languishing between Gabriel's thighs as he jerks Gabriel's cock between a teasing, loose-circled thumb and forefinger. Peter's gaze skitters between Gabriel's face and his dick, before he leans back a little, trying to take in both at once, to watch the movement of his hand and the reaction it produces.

"You like this, right?" Peter asks again, grinning wickedly at Gabriel's gasp of affirmation when his tongue swipes curiously along Gabriel's slit. "Because it's not like I know what I'm doing or anything."

He shrugs and Gabriel smiles, stroking Peter's face with the back of his hand. Gabriel's head tips backwards with a groan when Peter angles his neck and lets Gabriel feel the tip of his cock pressed tight against his cheek. More than the soft, wet suction of Peter's mouth, and more than the glide of his tongue or the rumble of his moans, what Gabriel finds most erotic is the confession that Peter, who has had as many dates with guys as girls, has held off and waited, being selfish enough to accept but refusing to reciprocate, simply to save this up for Gabriel and Gabriel alone.

He tries to lie still, to simply take what he is given, but his fingers twist and tug in Peter's hair, seemingly of their own accord, and soon the need to thrust is more than Gabriel can resist. His hips buck up and his dick slides further in between Peter's beautiful, flushed, and swollen lips, and when Peter's teeth graze against him as he struggles to cope with the sudden stretch and gag of Gabriel's cock pressing on his tongue, Gabriel finds he likes the sting of pain it brings.

He groans and grunts and writhes on the bed because Peter's mouth is like nothing he has ever felt before. He wonders if Peter was like this, too, the first time someone sucked his cock---loud, startled, and too swept up in pleasure to care how many embarrassing noises he made.

Then, Peter is pushing at Gabriel's hip with all the wiry strength of his arm, and it's forceful enough to start a mottled, hand shaped bruise on Gabriel's bookish, too-pale skin. He cradles Gabriel's balls in his hand, kneading them up against Gabriel's body. Peter's so busy concentrating on the cock in his mouth and the sac in his hand that he misses the half-hearted warning shove that is all Gabriel has the strength to muster before he comes.

Peter splutters a little, laughing in surprise as Gabriel's cock slips from his mouth, still pulsing, and the last ribbons of Gabriel's spunk smear across his lips and chin.

"Sorry," Gabriel moans, watching Peter spit into a handful of tissue snatched from his bedside table.

But Peter merely shakes his head, still clearing his throat. He leans down and kisses Gabriel senseless. What few tattered fragments of thought Gabriel has clung to in the aftermath of his orgasm, scattered with the strange, indecent taste of his own come between their lips.

Gabriel's hands ghost down Peter's chest, meandering towards his fly. He doesn't expect his hands to tremble, but they do. Though he wants to reciprocate, to make Peter feel a fraction of the ecstasy that Peter has given him, Gabriel finds himself suddenly shy, fearing that whatever inexperienced fumbling he can manage will never compare to whoever Peter's had before.

"You don't have to, Gabe," Peter says as he catches his hands, and it seems, as it always does, that Peter knows his mind before he does.

"But I want---" he tries but Peter shushes him with a finger to his lips.

"Roll over for me, Gabriel." And he does, settling on his stomach as Peter's hands card through his hair and stroke wide, soothing arcs over his back. He wriggles his legs and lets Peter pull away his crumpled pants, creased so badly now that their mother will purse her lips and frown.

Now, Gabriel isn't shy or nervous, because it feels like this is the moment that they have both been building to. A welcome sense of calm settles over Gabriel, and it's more than just his afterglow. It's the feeling of pieces falling into place, an overwhelming sense of _rightness_, no matter how wrong the rest of the world might see it.

He turns his head to the side and watches Peter strip, awestruck as ever, by his twin's lithe, bronzed body, narrow where Gabriel is broad, all sinew where Gabriel is muscle. He wants to tell Peter how beautiful he is, but Peter would roll his eyes and tell him to stop being such a girl. Words like "hot" and "so fucking sexy" seem too obscene, near blasphemous, to use right now, so Gabriel just groans, long and low and guttural. Peter's gaze darts to Gabriel's lips and focuses there.

With a bottle of lube in hand, scavenged from the drawer of his bedside table, Peter kneels over him. Crooked lips press a kiss to the back of his neck and the squeak of the lube bottle as Peter pops it open resounds in the room. Peter's fingers trail once, dry, between his ass cheeks. Gabriel pulls one knee to his chest, spreading himself so that Peter can more easily find his way.

Then, he feels a cool dribble on the small of his back and Peter swears beneath his breath as he squeezes far too much of the lube into his palm. Wet drops splatter everywhere as Peter's sopping fingers slide along his cleft, and soon, Gabriel's skin feels slick and sodden from his thighs to the base of his spine. How much of what that slickness is lube, and how much sweat, and Peter's pre-come, Gabriel doesn't know.

Fingertips stroke his asshole and Gabriel almost giggles, _almost_, because it tickles a little and yet feels weirdly nice. He's surprised to feel the ring of muscle there flutter under Peter's gentle touch.

"I'm gonna…"

"Yeah," Gabriel moans, lacing his fingers with Peter's where they brace against the mattress. He sighs as one slender finger probes its way inside him.

"Is that ok?"

"Mmm," he hums. "Ok" isn't the quite word that Gabriel would use, if he could corral his thoughts enough to think in terms more complex than "oh" and "yes" and "more," because it's a confusing mix of good and not. Two fingers now dip into him. Gabriel thinks that he could do without the sting and burn that comes with being stretched open so wide, but nothing has ever felt as intimate as this.

In and out, gradually picking up speed, Peter's fingers thrust inside him. He's tender and considerate and not once does Peter let his own desire, his cock hot like a brand pressed against Gabriel's skin, make his movements rough or hasty. He's searching deep in Gabriel's body, twisting and curving as gently as he can. Gabriel knows what spot Peter wants to hit and he desperately wants Peter to find it, giddy in anticipation of the blinding bursts of pleasure that the internet has told him being touched _there_ will bring. But Gabriel doesn't know his body well enough, yet, to offer any direction.

It seems both so right and wrong that Peter understands him better than he does himself, picking up on what feels good before the sounds of pleasure spill unfettered from Gabriel's lips. He wonders how much of that is the natural way their twin minds sync and how much of that is from past experience. Gabriel doesn't really want to know, not now at least, but he can't stop himself from asking.

"Have you ever? Before?"

"What? Gabe, no," Peter whispers. There's sadness in his voice, a tinge of hurt that Gabriel has felt the need to ask. Gabriel squeezes his hand apologetically.

"I mean… Once. With a girl. But that's not the same."

As if to underscore his words, Peter's fingers graze over Gabriel's prostate and at first it's disappointing---pleasurable but not a wringing, all-body orgasm like he's been promised by those filthy websites he's spent hours on in anticipation of this day. Then, Peter's fingers brush over it again, and again, and again, and Gabriel's vision _does_ white out and he _does_ shout himself hoarse. He shudders and his ass clamps down tight on Peter's fingers, dragging him deeper inside himself. When Gabriel can finally breathe again, he has to grope with a frantic hand between his stomach and the sheets because he can scarcely believe that he hasn't come.

He's panting, hard, and Peter is kissing his shoulders and kneading with his free hand up and down Gabriel's spine. Gabriel arches back into him, thrusting himself back onto Peter's hand, and Peter's fingertips are unwittingly on that spot again. In one long breath, Gabriel exhales, "Oh, Jesus Christ, Peter! That feels so good!"

Peter's laughter rings in the room, drowning out the music and chatter from the party below. Maybe it's relief or surprise, or the simple fact that it's a shock to hear himself curse, even with words so mild they barely merit as an oath, because that's something Gabriel never does, but Gabriel finds he's laughing, too. Peter collapses down on top of him and Gabriel reaches back to twine his fingers in Peter's too-long hair.

For a while, they lie with Peter above and Gabriel below, necks twisted so that they can kiss, awkward as it may be, while Peter fondles Gabriel inside. Soft and teasing, brusque and rough, Peter tests the limits of what Gabriel can endure, before, with sweat pooled between them, they both know that it's now or never and Peter's fingers slide free.

It takes nothing more than a shift of Peter's hips and one more snick and squeeze of the lube and they're ready, the head of Peter's cock pressing against him, hot, broad, and blunt.

"I love you," Peter whispers, and Gabriel nearly laughs because they never say that. They never need to, and to say it now seems clichéd in the worst possible way. But all the same, Gabriel replies, "I love you too," and squeezes Peter's hip reassuringly, urging him inside.

Then, Gabriel's existence is nothing but Peter; Peter over him, Peter around him, the stuttering, stop-start push of Peter's dick as he works himself inside him. Peter's teeth bite his shoulder and his skin is sore, wet from Peter's mouth. Braced beside his head, Gabriel can see Peter's knuckles grow taut and white with tension, fisting the sheets more violently with every twitch of his hips that aches to be a full-fledged thrust.

Peter seems bigger than Gabriel has ever imagined, thick and in so deep that when Peter presses at Gabriel's tensing stomach, Gabriel feels sure that Peter must feel himself there beneath his palm.

"Ok?" Peter groans. His voice is ragged as his hips finally still.

"Yeah," Gabriel moans, unable to fathom where he has found the breath to speak at all.

He can feel Peter's balls, resting heavy against his ass and there's so much lube squelching between them that it's trickling down, from his hole or Peter's cock, or maybe both, and trailing a slick path over his own sac. In the midst so many overwhelming sensations that tug at his nerve endings and threaten with every breath to topple him over into orgasm before this has even begun, it is that dribbling rivulet of lube that tickles the hairs on the back of his balls that Gabriel focuses on to stop himself from being swept under too soon.

When Peter starts to move, it hurts. Gabriel can't be sure if it's just too soon or if it's meant to hurt like this, but he grits his teeth and presses into the pain because he can tell that Peter can't hold back much longer. There's something inside him, instinct he guesses, buried at his very core and it's telling Gabriel to move. So, he rises up on his hands and knees, reaching a hand between his thighs to stop Peter from slipping from him with the sudden switch in position.

He moulds one hand to Peter's hip and holds it there, adjusting the angle, speed and depth of his thrusts. Gabriel doesn't know how he suddenly knows what he needs, but he _does_, and he's right, because the head of Peter's cock is _there_, riding roughshod over Gabriel's prostate. It's not long before he comes, because with Peter inside him and with Peter's hand wrapped with such familiar ease around him, there's little that Gabriel can do but surrender to it all.

Gabriel's cock has barely ceased pulsing when Peter groans through his own release. He's always been the louder of the two, less inhibited when he comes, shouting out while Gabriel bites his lips and tries to stifle the moans that threaten to escape, but Gabriel has never heard him sound so carnal, so raw and visceral. That noise in his ear, and the unexpected aftershocks that accompany the slick, wet rush of Peter's semen inside him, are enough to make Gabriel's softening cock give a desperate, painful twitch.

They break apart, breathless, and Peter flops onto his back beside him, muttering words that Gabriel can't hear over the still-pounding pulse in his ears. He's sweaty and sticky and he feels as if he's been bruised so roughly that purple marks must be forming far inside his ass, but he also feels good---better than good, _astounding_\---sated like he's never been before. And if Gabriel never has sex again, he thinks that the memory of this time will be good enough to carry him through.

Then, he remembers that Peter is leaving in only a few hours and it will be months before he does have sex again, if Peter even wants to do this again. This time, it's Gabriel who turns to Peter for reassurance and whispers, "I love you."

Peter rolls to face him, a beatific smile upon his lips. He runs his fingers through Gabriel's sweat-damp hair and ruffles it, bringing his face close so their noses nuzzle together.

"I love you too," he whispers, and this time, laughing is the furthest thing from Gabriel's mind. They've crossed a line tonight. They've done something together that they can never undo or ignore, and they'll never be solely brothers again, if they ever really were. Gabriel's chest grows tight and suddenly, saying "I love you" seems wholly inadequate when trying to tell Peter exactly how he feels.

But maybe Peter feels the same way too, because when Gabriel starts to stammer, struggling to say what he wants to say before Peter slips away from him to South America, Peter nips at the tip of his nose. Gabriel yelps and a lifetime's worth of brotherly reflexes can't be suppressed simply because they've now made love, so he punches Peter's arm and Peter slaps his. Then, they're squirming and wrestling on the bed as if they aren't naked, and as if Peter's come isn't still leaking from Gabriel's ass, mixed with lube and sweat. And though Gabriel is the stronger, he lets Peter pin his hands above his head and straddle him.

Peter leans down and kisses him, possessive on the eve of his departure like he's never been before. Gabriel wants to say that Peter doesn't need to stake his claim on him like this, because he's always been his and he always will, but instead, he threads his fingers through Peter's bangs and brushes them behind his ear.

"Your hair's getting long," he teases.

"You sound like Mom," Peter says, rolling his eyes in a way that Gabriel thinks he'll miss as much as their illicit kisses. "I was thinking of growing it; coming back from Chile with a better tan and a ponytail."

"Mom and Dad would freak. Nathan, too."

"And you?"

"Does it matter?"

"More than anything."

"I like it like this," Gabriel breathes, twisting his fingers around a strand of Peter's hair and pulling him down to rest upon his shoulder.


End file.
